Video Helps Document Mcveigh Trail

Prosecutors Detail Defendant's Actions 5 Days Before Blast

May 11, 1997|By Maurice Possley, Tribune Staff Writer.

DENVER — The owner of a body shop and truck rental agency in Junction City, Kan., identified Timothy McVeigh in court Friday as the man who rented the Ryder truck used in the bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building.

"I was looking right at him," declared Eldon Elliott, owner of Elliott's Body Shop, recalling the two occasions when McVeigh, now 29, entered his shop--on April 15, 1995, to reserve a truck and pay the $280.32 rental fee in advance; and on April 17 to pick up the 20-foot Ryder truck. He said McVeigh used the name "Robert Kling."

"That's the way I look at everybody," he told jurors and U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch. "I look at them right square in the face."

Asked to point him out, Elliott gestured to the defense table. "Right over there. Blue shirt."

McVeigh sat stone-faced, wearing a blue oxford shirt with long sleeves rolled up. He did not acknowledge Elliott's identification.

The testimony came on a day when prosecutors presented a series of witnesses and documents, including telephone records, a taxi log and a Chinese food takeout order, as well as surveillance photos from a McDonald's restaurant, to trace McVeigh's movements from April 14, 1995, when prosecutors say he arrived in Junction City, until April 17, when the Ryder truck was driven from Elliott's shop around 4:30 p.m.

The Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City was shattered by an explosion at 9:02 a.m. on April 19, 1995, killing 168 people and injuring more than 500 others.

McVeigh is on trial on charges of murder and conspiracy.

Prosecutors claim McVeigh arrived in Junction City on April 14, where he sold his car and purchased a yellow 1977 Mercury Marquis. He allegedly walked to the J and K bus depot where he called Elliott's to obtain a price quote on a Ryder truck rental.

According to testimony, McVeigh checked into the Dreamland Motel later that day and stayed until the 17th.

Prosecutors say he drove the truck to Geary Lake in Kansas, that 4,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate laced with nitromethane were loaded into the truck there, and that it was driven to Oklahoma City and detonated.

Elliott testified that on April 15, McVeigh came to the body shop and reserved the truck, to be picked up at 4 p.m. two days later.

Elliott said that McVeigh gave him the $280.32 in exact change after declining to pay an additional amount for insurance. He rented the truck using a driver's license in the name of "Robert Kling" that showed an address in Redfield, S.D., Elliott said.

To piece together McVeigh's movements, prosecutors called Yuhua Bai, owner of Hunam Palace, in Junction City, who testified that shortly after 5 p.m. on April 15 she took a phone order for moo goo gai pan and egg rolls from a caller who gave the name "Kling" and requested delivery to Room 25 at the Dreamland. According to previous testimony, McVeigh was assigned Room 25.

Phone records indicated were shown to the jury indicating that a call was made from that room to the Hunam Palace at 5:17 p.m. on the 15th.

Prosecutors also called David D'Albini, manager of the McDonald's at the time, who narrated surveillance photographs taken in the restaurant April 17.

Watching a TV monitor, jurors saw McVeigh, clad in a plaid shirt and jeans, approach the counter and later walk out of the restaurant.

The video, which carried a date and time stamp, showed him leaving the restaurant at 3:57 p.m.